Wolves target Kirilenko, ready to deal to make room

The shelf life on that Wayne Ellington-Dante Cunningham trade sure didn't last long...

Remember last Friday's blog post about Andrei Kirilenko?

Well...

The Wolves indeed are targeting the 31-year-old Russian small forward and are willing to pay him $18 million over the next two season -- with a player option for a third -- league sources tell me and are trying to deal Wes Johnson and a future 1st-round pick to make cap room for him.

Yahoo!Sports Tuesday evening reported a three-way deal between the Wolves, Phoenix and New Orleans is near.

The Hornets would get center Robin Lopez from the Suns in a sign-and-trade and the Wolves basically, it seems, would give up a first rounder to get the Suns to take the $4.3 million contract of Johnson, who they drafted fourth overall just two years ago.

The Yahoo! story also said Brad Miller would be coming back to the Wolves two weeks after they traded him to New Orleans.

Jerry Zgoda missed the entire Kevin Garnett era, but he's back covering the Timberwolves after working the beat for their first four seasons two decades ago. In between, he covered a bit of everything: Gopher men's and women's basketball and NCAA athletics, golf, outdoor recreation, sports media and a little Vikings and Twins.